Author: Bob Dancer

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Is There a Different Strategy and How Can I Be Sure? — Part I of II

One of the casinos I play at is Dotty’s, which is a chain of more than 100 15-machine outlets all across Nevada, plus a few larger ones. There are perhaps 10 of them within 10 miles of my home.

One of the promotions that attracts me relates to W2Gs. Every week, 10% of the W2Gs earned company-wide earn a 10% bonus. That is, if you receive a $4,000 royal flush, 10% of the time you receive an additional $400 in cash. I estimate the value of that by assuming I’ll get an extra $40 for every such jackpot. (in other words, $40 every time adds up to the same number as $400 10% of the time.)  I’ll end up with the same EV, although I’ll be underestimating the variance a little.

My game of choice currently is 9/5 Super Double Bonus. If I play that game for at least $25 per hand, I’ll get W2Gs for all quads as well as for each straight flush and royal flush.

I’ve known the strategy for that game for some time and I’ve written about it periodically. The question I’m looking at today and next week is: Does the strategy change with the Dotty’s promotion? And if so, what are those changes? Further, assume that I’m not a computer programmer and I don’t have access to computer software that you don’t. So how do I go about this?

I wish to learn to play the game perfectly. I understand that this may not be your goal. Still, learning how to do it is what this week’s and next week’s columns are all about. Someday there may well be a promotion that you wish to figure out.

The software I’m going to use for this analysis is the Wizard of Odds (WOO) Video Poker Strategy Calculator. It will give you a perfect strategy and it’s available for free online. Although I’m not a huge fan of the notation used on that product, it’s hard to complain too loudly when it’s free and completely accurate.

For the base game, the pay schedule is 800, 80, 160, 120, 80, 50, 9, 5, 4, 3, 1, 1   Adding 1% to each of the top six figures will make the return on one of them 50.5. Although the WOO software does accept decimal points, I prefer to multiply all of the amounts by 10. That is 8000, 800, 1600, etc. Since the strategy is calculated using relative values, multiplying all pay schedule categories by a fixed amount has no effect whatsoever on the strategy.

For the Dotty’s version, I enter the payout amounts as 8080, 808, 1616, 1212, 808, 505, 90, 50, 40, 30, 10, 10. The lowest six pay schedule categories don’t receive the 1% increase because they don’t result in W2Gs. If I wanted to bet $134 or more per single-line hand, I could get W2Gs on full houses as well. For today we can ignore that refinement.

In the chart below, the numbers in red indicate numbers for the base 9/5 SDB game. The numbers in green represent the numbers for the Dotty’s version.

The actual chart created by the WOO software has several more columns to it that I’ve omitted here. If you duplicate either the red or green Payoff numbers in the WOO Video Poker Strategy Calculator, you’ll see the omitted columns. Those columns include useful information, but not information we’re using today. If you don’t duplicate this information yourself, how do you know if you can do it? It’s not difficult, but “practice makes perfect.” If you don’t know how to use a tool, it’s the same as not having the tool at all.

In the red section of the chart, find the number 490,732,320. That’s the number of occurrences for royal flushes out of 19,933,230,517,200. (In a recent Gambling with an Edge episode, Michael Shackleford explained where this number comes from.) In the green section, the corresponding number is 491,575,464.

That means that when you change strategies to take advantage of these W2G bonuses, you get more royals. You should be able to see you also get more straight flushes, more aces, more 2s-4s, and more 5s-Ts. For some reason I’ll explain next week, you get fewer Js-Ks.

Okay. Now I know there are strategy changes. This is the first part of what I wanted to know. I now need to find out what these changes are.

I’m going to tell you what those changes are — next week. I’m going to use the WOO Video Poker Strategy Calculator to do this. What I strongly recommend is that you work this out yourself. All the information you need is in the software which is online and free. As I said before, if you don’t know how to use a tool, it’s the same as not having the tool at all.

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If That’s Random, You Can Bite Me!

This column is inspired by an email I received about 20 years ago, when TITO tickets weren’t found everywhere. I don’t have the email in front of me, but I remember the gist of it and certainly the line that I’m using as a title. For the rest, I’m using some artistic license that I believe is fairly close to the original.

Dear Mr. Dancer:

Life is so unfair!

I was playing quarter 9/6 Jacks or Better at my local casino. With the 0.67% cash slot club, it’s mildly positive. The lady next to me, let’s call her “Lucky Lucy,” was playing 9/5 Double Double Bonus, a game that you say is so bad that it should be avoided.

Anyway, Lucky Lucy was dealt AAAA2 for a $500 hand pay. Three hands later LL got 22223. The 800 quarters started to spill into her tray, but the hopper went dry before she got the whole $200. So, they came and filled up the machine. About 10 hands later, LL nailed a $1,000 royal flush!

I’m playing the so-called good game and losing my ass! In less than 20 hands, which took more than 20 minutes because she needed so much servicing from the casino staff, on a terrible game, she was ahead $1,700. I’m starting to believe that pay schedules mean squat. You’re either lucky or you’re not!

And random – smandom! If you think this was a random result you can bite me!

Frustrated Fred

 

Dear FF:

Yes, I think it was a random result, but I respectfully decline your culinary invitation.

LL had an extremely lucky run that she’ll be talking about for the rest of her life! Thirty years from now, she’ll be saying, “Let me tell you about that time back in 1996 when . . . .“  She was playing a less-than-98% game that normally eats her lunch. There will be ugly stretches where that game pays less than 90% over a few thousand hands — as well as very occasional times where she wins big. Even including the “never-in-my-wildest-dreams” session you just described, she’ll be a big loser on this game over time.

Could it happen that she quits forever and ends up a net winner on that terrible game after such a wonderful run? Theoretically, I suppose, but it usually doesn’t work that way. What is more likely is that she’ll come back as soon as possible to see if she can capture lightning in a bottle one more time. And the most likely result is that she is going to lose — because that’s the nature of that game.

You, on the other hand, are playing a dull little game where, over time, you’re going to lose almost a half percent, which is more than offset by the generous slot club. There will be days you win and more days you lose, but over time it will come pretty close to the half percent it’s supposed to (assuming you play well) and you’ll be a net winner after collecting your slot club benefits.

What “random” means in this case is that the results mimic those of a freshly shuffled fair deck. Sometimes you’re randomly dealt four aces and a kicker (one time in 216,580, if you’re counting). Unusual? Yes. It certainly doesn’t happen every day or even every year to a given player. But it happens. It happened to LL while you were sitting next to her and she got $500. It’ll happen to you just as often, maybe next time will be a year or three down the road, but you’ll only get $31.25. At times like that, it’s hard to see that receiving an extra $1.25 for every time you end up with two pair pays off better in the long run. But it does! If you want to complain about playing the wrong game when such a nice hand is dealt, you won’t be the first one to do so! Many video poker players complain a lot!

“Random” includes lots of results that are surprising because they happened TODAY. It never happens that you play 1,000 hands and get the exactly predicted number of every hand. It can’t happen because some hands have cycles much longer than 1,000 hands. It’s going to take about 40 of those 1,000-hand cycles to receive a royal, and 650 of those cycles to be dealt a royal. But dealt royals happen randomly — once every 649,740 hands on average. Keep playing and you’ll occasionally be dealt a royal. It happens. Randomly!

Good video poker players have come to believe that over time, the results end up where they should. Over millions of hands, you’ll end up with approximately the correct number of royals, straight flushes, 3-of-a-kinds, etc. If you’re playing where you have the advantage, you’re very likely to be ahead after millions of hands. If you’re behind after millions of hands, it most likely is because you were playing games where you did not have the advantage.

Can I guarantee this? No. Of course not. Depending on how big your edge is and how many hands you’ve played, you might be an 80% favorite to be ahead, or a 90% favorite, or a 99.993% favorite, or whatever. You will never be a 100% favorite to be ahead, but we don’t live our lives with 100% guarantees. (You can’t 100% guarantee that you’ll be alive a week from now, for example.)

But you can BET you’ll be ahead, and really that’s what we’re doing when we gamble. It can be a very, very smart bet to make, even if we can’t be positive that we’ll always win.

But even though I can’t guarantee I’ll win over the next however-many years, I 100% believe I’ll do very well and am betting considerable amounts that it’s true.

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Whose Responsibility Is It?

For the November 16 Gambling with an Edge podcast, Richard and I welcomed David Clary, author of the book Gangsters to Governors: The New Bosses of Gambling in America. That podcast speaks for itself and I’m not covering here what we talked about on the podcast.

The last chapter of the book, called “Double or Nothing,” discussed something we didn’t talk about — problem gambling. It’s a real thing. While exact numbers are elusive, millions of Americans suffer from it.

In many jurisdictions, casinos and government agencies chip in to provide some help to these gamblers. There are a number of “self-exclusion” programs in various states that sometimes are more-or-less effective in keeping some of these people out of casinos. A strong case could be made that more needs to be done.

With some players for whom gambling is not a problem, it’s easy to conclude that having a problem is simply a self-control issue. Like, if you have a gambling problem, just stay out of casinos. Like, alcoholics should just stop drinking. And obese people should just show restraint at the dinner table. And tobacco addicts should just plain stop smoking. It’s like, “I don’t have a problem with this and you shouldn’t either!”

I personally don’t believe anything of the sort described in the preceding paragraph. I believe these are real problems with real pain and costs associated with them. What it’s caused by, I don’t know. Bottom line, though, is that I’m not at all certain what to do about it.

I regularly write things like, “If the pay schedule combined with the slot club and promotions isn’t good enough, don’t play.” I know that’s a key part of success at video poker. Players who don’t follow that advice basically have no chance of being a long-term winner. I think this is considerably different from, “If you have a problem with gambling, just stay out of casinos,” but it’s easy to envision disagreement on how different the two phrases are.

My writings assume that people CAN refrain from playing. But I also assume that very few problem gamblers read my scribblings. I have no idea how valid this assumption is, but surely some problem gamblers occasionally read my works.

Every reputable and conscientious how-to-gamble-effectively writer faces this dilemma. How do you provide information to players who can benefit from it without simultaneously giving problem gamblers false hope? If I knew the answer to that, I’d do it. But I just don’t know.

I am NOT planning on stopping my writing. Whatever your opinion on the matter is, I believe I help more people than I harm. I do not believe that the problem would be cured or even lessened if I stopped writing.

I do donate to Gambler’s Anonymous. Is that the best place to give? I don’t know. How much I give is none of your business. I’m not giving out of guilt. I do not feel guilty for being a video poker teacher. But it bothers me that in at least a few cases, my writings have ended up being harmful rather than helpful.

Most people who read my columns are players in the video poker community. While I’m more famous in that community than most of my readers are, the “how-to-deal-with-this-issue” problem is not mine alone.

You may turn a blind eye to this problem or you can try to do something about it. You’re going to have to decide for yourself. The only thing that is certain to me is that the problem isn’t going to magically disappear just by ignoring it.

I know this column is a bit of a downer, but sometimes the real world is like that. Sometimes it’s important to shine a spotlight on problems and, for me, this is the day to do it for this particular problem.

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You’re Upsetting Our Players

In 1999, I started communicating with “Richard,” the marketing director of the Laughlin Flamingo hotel. (Today the same property is called the Aquarius, and it may change names again because the parent company is in the process of changing owners.) Richard knew my name because I wrote columns for Strictly Slots and Casino Player, both of which were distributed for free in that casino.

He wanted to use my “fame,” such as it was, to draw in customers, but he didn’t really want me to teach his players how to beat him. Was there any middle ground?

I suggested he hold a video poker tournament, giving away whatever amount he wanted, and I could teach a class on “How to Succeed in a Video Poker Tournament.” His players would get real value because tournament play definitely has some skill elements to it (in addition to a considerable amount of luck) and most of the lessons for tournament play don’t translate into regular casino play. We reached a deal for me to host two events over the next year.

The only tournament software they had was for Jacks or Better.  An unusual choice for a video poker tournament, but I could adjust my class accordingly.

One of the major points in tournament strategy is that on the last hand, if you aren’t “in the money,” you should go for broke. If a tournament had 250 entrants and paid out 50 places, then being in 51st place was tied with 250th place. Zero is zero. This is very different from casino play, where 51st place might represent a profit of $100 and 250th place might be a loss of $500. These aren’t the same at all.

Players are used to the concept that a higher score is better than a lower score, but this is only true in tournaments if you’re above the “bubble.” If you’re below the bubble, all scores are equal.

Since it was a Jacks or Better tournament, the example hand I used was being dealt AAAAT on the last hand where you weren’t already in the money. Assuming 125 coins (the payout for four aces in this game) wouldn’t be enough to move you into pay dirt, you should throw away three of the aces and just hold the suited AT. Your only chance was to get a royal flush. You didn’t have a big chance — actually 1-in-16,215, but a small chance was better than no chance at all.

If this were the more standard Double Double Bonus tournament, I would have picked a different hand. Four aces pay at least 800 credits, maybe 2,000, and just that score would usually be enough to move you into the money.

The following year I received a call from “Cheryl” who was Richard’s assistant. She said Richard was busy, but she was asked to call and see if they could get me to Laughlin again for two more events. But there would have to be a few changes in the contract.

First, they wanted to lower my fee by $100 each time. Since I had already prepared my notes, it would be easier on me and that should be reflected in the price. I told Cheryl that I wasn’t crazy about this change. At that same time, there was a casino in Las Vegas that was giving away the store (I didn’t tell her this was the MGM Grand).  To induce me to come down to Laughlin for two days at a time would take more money, not less. But what was the other change you were talking about? Maybe that would offset the money.

She told me there were complaints from some of the seniors that I was telling them to throw away four aces! They didn’t get such a good hand very often and they just KNEW this couldn’t be right. Since the complaints went through her, it would be making her life easier if I never told them to throw away four aces.

I asked her if she understood the context behind sometimes throwing away the aces. She didn’t. She didn’t care. She never gambled anyway so she paid no attention to somebody else’s silly ideas about gambling. She really only cared about getting fewer complaints from the players.

I asked her if Richard knew about the changes she was requesting. She said no, but she was sure he would be proud of her for reducing the costs and not making the players angry.

I told her “No thanks,” but if they wished to increase my fee and allow me to teach the class as I saw fit, she knew how to get in touch with me. She never did.

I never taught there again, but as I recall things worked out pretty well for me at the MGM Grand.

 

Author’s Note:  The next semester of classes at the South Point will begin Tuesday January 9. The original schedule of classes on bobdancer.com accidentally said Sunday January 7. The schedule has been repaired, but I want to make sure everybody has gotten the word.

Should anyone be worried about the classes upsetting them, I promise that this semester I will never tell you to throw away four aces!

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Understanding a Flow Chart in Super Double Bonus

Super Double Bonus is a version of Double Bonus where four jacks, queens, and kings earn 600 coins instead of 250 and the straight flush returns 400 instead of 250. The best-paying version, which returns 45 for the full house and 25 for the flush, returns 99.695% when played well. When combined with a decent slot club and/or set of promotions, this can be a profitable game to play when you find it.

One of the trickiest parts of the strategy is when you are dealt an ace of one suit and a “JT” of another. Depending on the other two cards, sometimes you hold the “JT”, sometimes you hold the ace by itself, and sometimes you hold AJ.

For me to learn this, I created a flow chart which I believe is 100% accurate in this area of the strategy chart — although it presumes you know that a 4-card open-ended straight and a 3-card straight flush with one high card and two insides are both more valuable than the options presented in the flow chart. It follows relatively simple logic — but even relatively simple logic requires more concentration and study than some of my readers wish to endure.

What I thought I’d do is to present my flow chart, give you some sample hands to play, and let you see how you do. Afterwards, I’ll go through the flow chart more slowly and maybe it will be easier to understand.

And if you’re not in the mood for the logic of 9-5 SDB, it’s okay with me if you always play “JT” when you come to these hands. You won’t be giving up a whole lot. For some folks, making these kinds of distinctions cause their heads to hurt. If that’s you, take this column off and come back next week.

A versus “JT”:

 

Is there a flush penalty to the “JT”?

If no, play “JT”  — end

If yes, continue

 

Is the flush penalty to the “JT” a 2-6 and the fifth card suited with the A?

If yes, is it an 8 or 9?

If yes, play AJ — end

If no, play “JT” — end

If no, continue

 

Is the flush penalty to the ”JT” a 2-5 and the fifth card an 8 or 9?

If yes, play A — end

If no, play “JT” — end

 

Is the flush penalty to the ”JT” a 6 and the fifth card a 7, 8 or 9?

If yes, play A — end

If no, play “JT” — end

 

Using the above logic, play these hands:

  1. A♠ J♥ T♥ 2♠ 5♠
  2. A♠ J♥ T♥ 9♠ 7♦
  3. A♠ J♥ T♥ 9♠ 8♥
  4. A♠ J♥ T♥ 3♣ 7♥
  5. A♠ J♥ T♥ 9♣ 5♥
  6. A♠ J♥ T♥ 7♣ 6♥
  7. A♠ J♥ T♥ 7♣ 5♥
  8. A♠ J♥ T♥ 8♣ 2♥
  9. A♠ J♥ T♥ 8♠ 2♥
  10. A♠ J♥ T♥ 7♠ 6♥

Here are the answers. If you easily got them all correct, you don’t need to read any further:

  1. A♠ 2♠ 5♠
  2. J♥ T♥
  3. J♥ T♥ 9♠ 8♥
  4. J♥ T♥ 7♥
  5. A♠
  6. A♠
  7. J♥ T♥
  8. A♠
  9. A♠ J♥
  10. J♥ T♥

If you missed one or more of the above problems, the following explanations may help:

 

Is there a flush penalty to the “JT”?

If no, play “JT”  — end

If yes, continue

This rule is the easiest. Just look for a card suited with the “JT”. If you don’t find one, then “JT” is the play — unless, of course, some higher-ranking combination is in the hand.

 

Is the flush penalty to the “JT” a 2-6 and the fifth card suited with the A?

If yes, is it an 8 or 9?

If yes, play AJ — end

If no, play “JT” — end

If no, continue

We only get to this rule if there is a flush penalty to the “JT” and also a flush penalty to the A. Also, this is the only time we can hold AJ.  Notice that the flush penalty to the J cannot be a 7 or higher as that would make it a higher-ranking 3-card straight flush or 3-card royal flush. Also note that this says that if there is a flush penalty to the A, but it is not an 8 or 9, we hold the “JT”.

 

Is the flush penalty to the ”JT” a 2-5 and the fifth card an 8 or 9?

If yes, play A — end

If no, play “JT” — end

By the time we get here, there is no flush penalty to the ace.

 

Is the flush penalty to the ”JT” a 6 and the fifth card a 7, 8 or 9?

If yes, play A — end

If no, play “JT” — end

By the time we get here, there is no flush penalty to the ace. The only difference in the last two rules is when the fifth card is a 7. If the flush penalty to the J is a 6 (meaning it is not a straight penalty to the A), we hold the A by itself. If the flush penalty to the J is a 2-5 (which are all straight penalties to the A), we hold the J.

 

Do the notes in green help you any? If so, welcome to them.

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The Las Vegas Massacre and Me

Many of us are sick and tired of discussing the terrible events of October 1 and the speculation afterwards of what made this unhinged man do what he did. If that’s where you are and you want to skip this article, I won’t blame you.

Once it was discovered that Stephen Paddock played video poker, I started getting calls from a variety of news outlets. Although I didn’t get nearly as many calls as Anthony Curtis did, when something related to video poker makes the news, my name comes up as someone who might be able to offer some insight.

For each telephone interview, I started it off with the fact that I didn’t know the guy and had never heard his name until after he was dead. I don’t know if he was a winning player or not, but I have my doubts. And in my opinion, there is nothing inherent in the game of video poker that will create such a monster. So, with that said, how can I help you?

Some reporters wanted to know the difference between video poker and regular poker, or video poker and blackjack, and those were easy for me to answer. Some wanted to know why the game was so popular. To my mind it’s because the game is beatable, and even casual players can get relatively inexpensive casino vacations out of the game.

From there, the questions usually evolved to what other casino games were beatable. Years ago, I would have said blackjack, poker, and sports betting and that would have been the end of my list. But since I’ve been hosting the Gambling with an Edge podcast I’ve become aware that there are LOTS of different avenues for profiting in a casino other than just these games.

Some wanted to know how many winning players there are, and I had to say that any number I came up with would be a wild-assed guess.  I don’t know how much any other player nets, let alone how many of the tens of thousands of players (most of whom I have never met) had net scores greater than zero.

One question from the Associated Press was one that I didn’t want to address. The reporter argued that this attack exhibited a great deal of planning and would a successful video poker player have the ability to do such planning? I didn’t want to answer this question because the answer is “Yes!”

What I said was that a successful lawyer would have those planning skills, as would a successful architect, as would a successful chef, as would a successful political advisor, as would a successful reporter, as would basically a successful anything. So yes, you can add successful gambler of any stripe onto that list, but the list is very long.

One reporter told me that CNN reported Paddock was ahead more than $5 million in a recent year. Was this possible? I told them it was very possible that a high-stakes player had more than $5 million in W2G jackpots, but that’s an entirely different matter than being ahead that much. Or even ahead at all! Getting the total of W2Gs from the IRS might be obtainable by the police. But knowing whether he was ahead or behind was a totally different matter.

Four days after the shooting, Bonnie and I left for a long-scheduled two-week cruise from Boston to Quebec City and back again. While in Boston the night before the cruise, I checked my email and found one from Ryan Growney, the general manager of the South Point. He said that an FBI agent wanted to talk with me about the shooting and I should call him back right away to get that FBI agent’s phone numbers. Since I teach classes at the South Point and that casino sponsors the podcast, that casino was a reasonable place for the FBI to start looking for contact information.

Shit!

I’ve heard Bob Nersesian and other attorneys say you NEVER should talk to a police officer without having an attorney present. I figured that went double for talking to the FBI. Still, I was a couple thousand miles away from home and about to sail northwards soon. The $3.99 a minute charge for talking when the ship is actually at sea is relatively small change, of course, but I still didn’t want to pay it. I figured I could handle this, so I found out the number of the FBI special agent and called him.

The agent told me that my name was mentioned by several people when they asked, “Tell us the name of the most likely person you know who might have known Stephen Paddock.” Due to our “video poker connection” and the fact that I play what many would consider high stakes, it didn’t surprise me that my name had come up. When I said I had never heard of him, basically the interview was over.

Except, the agent wanted to fill out the form in front of him and he asked me if my name was Bob, or perhaps Robert? Another question I didn’t want to answer, but I told him that Bob Dancer was a pseudonym used for teaching and writing purposes.

This led to the next question of, “Would you mind telling me your real name?” The truthful (unspoken) answer was of course I minded, but I told him anyway, along with my address and phone number. That information could be easily obtained by the FBI anyway if they really wanted it, but I would prefer I wasn’t in their databases.

Oh well. I wasn’t going to lie to the FBI and making a big stand about something that wouldn’t be difficult for them to find out anyway would just make me look suspicious.

I said at the beginning of this article that I had my doubts that Stephen Paddock was a winning player. Why did I say that? Because articles said he’d been playing for high stakes for more than a decade and he was still allowed to play at a number of the biggest Las Vegas Strip casinos. From both personal experience and talking to many other successful players, I know that these places tend to restrict and/or remove players over whom they do not believe they have an advantage.

So, if he did have an actual advantage, he would have needed to fool several different casinos for more than a decade. And this, I believe, is unlikely. Even more unlikely is that the casinos would have allowed him to be $5 million ahead in one year.

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How Much Does It Cost?

Recently I posted an article concerning winning a Louis Vuitton handbag at an invited-guest event at the M casino. I said that I had played $100,000 in coin-in before the drawing so that I would continue to receive invitations to such events in the future.

Nobody told me that $100,000 in play was required. There is no magic formula that tells me how much to play in such circumstances. It’s done by feel. The better the invitation, EV-wise, the more I play. The nicer the casino, the more I play. If I’ve been winning at a place recently, I tend to play more. If I “have time,” meaning I’m not trying to squeeze several events (including non-casino activities) into a short period of time, I play more. Possibly no other player came up with the $100,000 figure for that event. This doesn’t mean that any of us are necessarily right or wrong. Each player has to work it out for himself.

It also depends on the available games, slot club, and other promotions. If my play will earn entries to one or two additional drawings in which I think I will have decent equity, I’ll tend to play more.

If I lose a lot early in a promotion like this, I tend to quit. Why? Because a major purpose of the play is to keep the invitations coming. If I lose $3,000 for an event with an estimated EV of $500, the casino marketing department is happy. They got what they wanted. Clearly, I’m a desirable customer in their opinion.  (If there were other promotions going on in that casino, as is usually the case, I might continue to play because I’m getting equity elsewhere. Being behind $3,000 or any other number is not a particularly meaningful event.)

Against this background, I received a question on the gamblingwithanedge.com forum that asked how much bankroll would it take to play $100,000 coin-in in Jacks or Better or Deuces Wild? I was vacationing at the time, so I didn’t respond immediately. I’m going to address this now.

This is an important thing to address before you start to play. You don’t want to tell your wife, “They gave us a $150 Dooney and Bourke handbag. We didn’t win the Louis Vuitton bag. Worse, other than the handbag, we’re flat broke now.”

Important though it is, the question isn’t anywhere near specific enough to be able to answer. What pay schedule are you talking about, what denomination, and what kind of game are you playing? That casino has 9/6 Jacks or Better and NSU Deuces Wild for dollar single line. Fairly fast players would take 25 hours to play $100,000 on such machines. These are not appropriate machines to play for such an event.

To get credit for “playing for an event,” pretty much you have to play that day. For a high-roller event where you intend to play $100,000, that probably means on $5 or $10 machines, or maybe $1 Ten Play, or 25¢ Fifty Play. Something like that. Each casino has its own mix of games. You have to check out each one before you decide what game to play. To be invited to this event, you needed to have played $800,000 coin-in over the previous January – June or July – December period. There are a few players who earned that status by grinding it out on dollar single-line games, but not too many. Most of us played larger games.

For a given game and pay schedule, playing it in the $5 version, $10 version, $1 Ten Play, and 25¢ Fifty Play versions required four different bankroll calculations. 9/6 Jacks or Better or NSU Deuces Wild don’t exist for these stakes at this casino. 9/6 Double Double Bonus does. Is that the game you want to know about? That game requires a significantly bigger bankroll than Jacks or Better — for a number of reasons.

The best tools to figure out bankroll are Video Poker for Winners and Dunbar’s Risk Analyzer for Video Poker. They each have their strengths. I use both.

Use them and you’ll see that the bankroll required is a probabilistic number. That is, if you are willing to accept a 10% risk of ruin, you need half the bankroll as if you are only willing to accept a 1% risk of ruin. What level of risk are you comfortable with?

You’ll also see that playing $5 machines is less risky than playing $10 machines. So what denomination do you want to play? On VPW, you’ll see that playing $1 Ten Play requires significantly less bankroll than playing $10 single line.

One person posted on the forum in response to the bankroll question that if you assume you’re not going to get royals, straight flushes, or 4-of-a-kinds, playing 9/6 Jacks will cost you about 9%. Although we might quibble whether it’s closer to 8.5% or 9%, this is basically correct. And, to me, essentially irrelevant.

This looks at bankroll calculations as a worst-case scenario. Assuming you’re talking about a $5 game, you’ll typically get around 9.5 quads per $100,000 coin-in, almost a half of a straight flush, and a tenth of a royal. Assuming you’re going to strike out on all of these is a very small number — on the order of 1/20,000. Could it happen? Sure. Will it happen this weekend? Almost certainly not. Will it ever happen to you? Probably not that either. If you had one of these promotions every week, this would happen once every 400 years. Good chance you’re not going to live that long.

And if you have some sort of a stop loss figure (for me, I indicated that if I lost $3,000 and this was the only promotion I was playing for, I would probably quit for the day) you’re not going to lose 9% of the entire amount.

So, my suggestion is to get one or more of the software products and wallow in the numbers. Over time, you’ll get a sense of what each game costs to play. You can tweak the parameters so that they are appropriate to the actual games you are playing at any particular casino.

I know that wallowing in the numbers is tougher for some than others. Still, that’s what it takes to become proficient in this game. If you can’t, or won’t, do this, getting good at video poker is a pretty difficult goal for you.

Being difficult doesn’t mean impossible. Richard Munchkin has said on the podcast that since he wasn’t particularly good with math, he teamed with others, some of whom were very good with numbers. Richard had a considerable number other strengths.

This is a LOT more useful information than coming up with a specific number and saying THAT’S the amount of bankroll you need. Any such number would need to be qualified twelve ways from Thursday and would be meaningless in real life situations.

Finally, whatever the bankroll calculators say, you need some experience to make sense of them. For example, the M has a senior drawing every Tuesday. (Obviously some of my readers aren’t eligible for a drawing where you must be 50 years of age or older.) Playing $100,000 coin-in improved my equity in that drawing. By how much? Who knows for sure? Possibly $50 or $100 more? Probably more than that, but I don’t have enough information to calculate it exactly. And even if I did, it would only be an average amount. I COULD end up with first prize of $1,500 or strike out altogether. If I calculated an average win of, say, $263.42, it will NEVER come out to be exactly that. And the casino had a couple of other promotions going on as well that are also hard to analyze accurately but playing an extra $100,000 helped my chances in those promotions as well.

And I like the benefits that come from having ICON status there. If I haven’t reached the $800,000 threshold for this six-month period, playing $100,000 is worth more to me than if I’ve already qualified. Things like this aren’t covered by the software analysis but are nonetheless important considerations in the winning process.

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Be Careful What You Wish For  

Say you’re playing 9/6 Jacks or Better and are dealt a hand like A♦ K♣ J♦ T♦ 3♦. The best play, of course, is AJT3. Many players hold the inferior AJT. As I see it, players make the lesser play for one of two reasons:

  1. They simply do not know that AJT3 is worth 3.7¢ more than AJT for the 5-coin dollar player — given that the fifth card dealt was an off-suit king. Holding the flush kicker is a rather advanced play and many players aren’t students of the game. Or maybe they go back and forth between games without understanding the differences between them and make more-or-less the same plays for all games.

 

  1. They know AJT3 is better and they just don’t care. They really love to get royals and 3.7¢ isn’t that big of a cost for a chance to get such an exciting hand.

 

Today I want to address that second group of players, namely the ones who are willing to pay an extra premium in order to get the royal flush. My position is that for most players, this is a costlier move than they realize.

When I spoke of that 3.7¢ difference in value between the two plays, the math included a 1-in-1,081 chance of getting a $4,000 royal flush. The trouble is that the $4,000 royal flush for most people isn’t worth $4,000.

First of all, there’s tipping. When they bring you your money, they usually provide you with 39 $100 bills and five twenties. You’re not required to tip, but many players give away one or more of their twenties to the casino staff. If you’re generous enough to give away all five twenties, you have increased the difference between holding AJT and AJT3 from 3.7¢ to 12.9¢. If you got the best hand available holding AJT3, namely a $30 flush, no casino employee would be there holding his/her hand out expecting a share of it.

Second, and far more importantly, there’s a W2G that comes along with that $4,000. If you’re playing in Mississippi, the state takes away $120 — with no chance of getting it back. Louisiana takes $240, and you can get some or all of that back by filing a Louisiana state income tax form. If you fill out the form yourself, it takes an hour or more and you may not do it correctly. If you hire a tax professional to do it, it can cost more than the $240 you’re hoping to get back. There are a few other states with similar policies. If you shrug off that extra $240 every 1-in-1081 times it occurs when you draw two cards to AJT, that increases the difference in EV between the two plays by an extra 22.2¢.

Possibly different from the state where you’re playing, the state where you reside has tax rules too. Some states let you deduct your gambling losses from your gambling winnings. Some don’t. Some states have a state income tax on gambling winnings. Some don’t. Professional gamblers have different rules than non-professionals. If you itemize your W2Gs, it reduces other benefits you can claim.

I’m not a tax expert by any means, but I can safely say that there are significant costs to getting a $4,000 royal flush for many players.

The third reason royal flushes can be “bad news” is that casinos get excited if you get too many of them. Not so much for $4,000 royals perhaps, but if you play for larger stakes, $20,000 or higher royal flushes end up with you being discussed by casino management. Although exactly how many royals you hit is largely luck, being lucky can get you kicked out. Nobody has everbbeen kicked out for hitting too many flushes.

If players correctly understood the factors discussed today, even on a hand like A♣ 6♥ J♣ T♣ 3♣, where AJT is superior to AJT3 by 5.1¢, these players would intentionally and intelligently go for the flush — simply because ending up with the royal has so many additional costs.

(I understand that the two hands presented today look virtually the same to many players and they cannot see why the correct play is different. That’s a discussion for another day.)

Playing for quarters or less makes you immune from these considerations at most casinos. Some casinos, however, do make a $1,000 jackpot a hand-pay situation. If that’s the case where you play, some of your immunity disappears.

Taking slightly the worst of it to go for a jackpot that creates a financial burden strikes me as similar to paying money to buy heroin. Heroin ends up destroying an individual and to pay money to do this boggles the mind. Most healthy people are disciplined enough to stay away from heroin. Few gamblers are disciplined enough to be willing to pay a small premium in order to stay away from royal flushes.

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Is This Correct?

I get lots of emails from players asking about this or that. If the questions aren’t too frequent from the same player, I usually answer them. I recently got a question which I very much disliked from a player named Gary.

“Bob, I’ve been trying to figure something out that Linda Boyd said on YouTube. She said that when you were dealt the 4♠ 9♣ J♥ Q♥ K♠ that you would hold the J♥ Q♥. Is that true, because to me the 9♣ is a penalty card, not really sure what to think of all this, would you help me out?”

Here are my problems with this question:

  1. It is so easy to look up how to play a hand using software. Any player trying to learn should have one or more video poker software products. This level of information is also available for free online. Emailing me to ask how to play a hand is equivalent to asking me to add 432 to 743. Yes, I know how to do it, but I’m not interested in being a calculator for you. If you are unable or unwilling to look up how to play a hand, playing video poker well is beyond your capabilities.

 

  1. Gary didn’t tell me what game he was talking about. For some games, 9/6 Jacks or Better among them (which is the game most authors write about), J♥ Q♥ is the correct play. For other games, such as the versions of Double Bonus where you receive 5-for-1 for a straight, you play 9♣ J♥ Q♥ K♠. Somehow, I’m supposed to figure out the game that Gary is interested in.

 

  1. Gary mentioned a penalty card, although not in a way that indicates he knows what he’s talking about. Penalty cards are a consideration for advanced players — and many such players think they are more trouble than they’re worth. At the minimum, however, you need to know basic strategy cold before you start messing with penalty cards. And if Gary is asking about this particular hand, he clearly doesn’t have basic strategy mastered.

The fact that Gary is at the intermediate level is neither here nor there. Everybody starts at the beginning and each one of us is at a different point along the learning curve. I’ve had raw beginners in my classes as well as students who are professional video poker players. If Gary were to attend class or discuss private lessons, that would be fine.

But asking me questions that he could answer easily himself is abusing my generosity. I do answer questions via email for free, but not questions like this.

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Something I Didn’t Expect

In early September, there was an invitational event at the M resort for their Icon guests, which is their highest tier level. Perhaps others were invited as well, but I’m not sure.

Just for showing up, you received your choice of nice brand name gifts — there was a Fitbit Watch, Dooney and Burke handbags, some TUMI accessories and some more choices. About 1/3 of the gifts were geared towards men and 2/3 were geared towards women. Since I’m no dummy, I took Bonnie along and let her pick what she wanted. In addition to the free gift, there were some better-than-average hors d’ oeuvres and an open bar.

While you didn’t need to play to get the gift, they had three separate drawings — 9 p.m., 9:30 p.m., and 10 p.m. — for some Louis Vuitton “packages,” consisting of a handbag, sunglasses, and one additional item. And entry tickets for this drawing was based on play.

Bonnie isn’t much into brand names. She took the attitude of, “Don’t play extra for me. Louis Vuitton accessories are way more expensive than what I normally use. Plus, I already have three handbags in closets won in other promotions that I haven’t used yet.”

It’s nice when Bonnie takes this “sensible” attitude. However, this time it would have been nice had she been a bit greedier. I had already decided that I should probably play at least $100,000 in coin-in to justify the invitation. The casino was putting out quite a bit of money for this promotion, and when they put out that kind of money, they expect players to play. If I took their nice gift without playing at all, perhaps I wouldn’t receive the invitation next time.

There was a combination of promotions going on there, so playing that much was probably a decent play — if I valued the Louis Vuitton package at close to retail. Bonnie’s sensible attitude took some of the value away. If she had a “Boy, that would be so special to win that prize!” attitude, clearly winning the package would be more valuable. Dollars and sense is one way to measure value, but how happy something makes Bonnie is also part of the equation for me.

I didn’t know how good of a chance for the Louis Vuitton package playing $100,000 coin-in would get me. I didn’t see a lot of players “going for it.” One lady who typically plays a lot at this kind of event had concert tickets somewhere else, so wasn’t going to play for a “must be there to win” drawing. She went, ordered her gift, and then went to the concert. Like Bonnie, she had a number of unused handbags from other casino promotions.

As luck would have it, my name was called at the 9 p.m. drawing. (Perhaps I had a competitive number of entries. Perhaps it was simply blind luck. I really don’t know.) There was a choice of three Louis Vuitton packages, so Bonnie decided which one suited her best. In addition to the Louis Vuitton package, she picked out a Dooney and Burke bag for her regular gift. So much for having too many handbags!

I checked to see if you could win more than once and found out the answer was “No.” That was the fair way to do it, but in case they didn’t have that rule, I’d make sure to stick around for the last two drawings as well. Since we couldn’t win again, we didn’t stick around.

Just before I left, one of the promotion managers came over and had me sign a $3,000 Tax Form 1099 for the Louis Vuitton package. Whoa! What’s this? I was not expecting this at all.

“That’s the retail price for the prize, so if you want to keep it, you have to sign for it. If you don’t want to keep it, we’ll call somebody else’s name.”

Bonnie had already fallen in love with her new handbag, so there was no way in the world that I would make her give it back. But the tax implications did surprise me some.

Had I known of the $3,000 1099 would I have still played for it? Probably. I get enough W2Gs and 1099s throughout the year that one more would not be a showstopper. It’s just most of the ones I get come with cash (like winning a $3,000 drawing). Having the tax form come with a gift is a bit unusual for me. And, naïve guy that I am about designer things, I was thinking $600 or so was the appropriate price for the gift.

I’m not complaining. Winning this prize was far more good news than bad. It was simply a surprise I wasn’t expecting.